Ben Griffin finishes title defense at Colonial with 65, one stroke out of playoff

Ben Griffin came up a shot short in an attempt to join Ben Hogan on the list of players who successfully defended their title at Colonial Country Club.

Griffin, who won a year ago in Fort Worth, made par on the 18th hole after his 50-foot birdie attempt lipped out. He carded a 5-under 65 and entered as the clubhouse leader at 11 under.

It wasn’t quite enough.

Eric Cole and Russell Henley both finished at 12 under and entered into a playoff. Henley, behind four straight birdies (including the playoff), won the tournament despite sitting four strokes back of Cole through the eighth hole.

Griffin tied for third with Alex Smalley and Mac Meissner. He was asked after the round — which matched the lowest of the day — to grade his 18 holes: He gave it a solid ‘A’.

“Got out of my rhythm and game plan a little bit on 11 but other than that I hit some really high quality shots,” Griffin noted, prior to being bumped by Henley, about his lone bogey Sunday at Colonial.

“The rest of the week was, I would say, ‘B’ to’ C’ [grade],” he added. “But we’re hard on ourselves. As golfers, it’s hard for me to actually grade myself. For all I know, I could win this golf tournament and like here I am saying I had my ‘B’ or ‘C’ game it’s like, well, if I won, I mean, I guess we can go to ‘A.’ But I don’t know, golfers are so hard, we’re almost perfectionists out there. And I feel like golf’s one of those sports you just got to, you’re going to have bad moments and you just got to let ‘em go and move forward and got to stay positive. I felt like I did a really good job of staying positive today.”

Hogan won the tournament in consecutive years twice when it was the Colonial National Invitation (1946-47 and 1952-53). He also won in a playoff in 1959.